Michael Portillo

One funny thing happened while we were waiting for filming to start.  I was stood chatting with his researcher, and I gave her a copy of Transition Handbook to give to him.  As we were talking, a somewhat gruff elderly gentleman who was passing by stopped and looked over his shoulder.  “What’s the name of that book?” he said.  She showed him, and he said “I have something to say, but carry on”.  We continued our conversation with him standing right next to us, following the conversation, clearly with something important to say.  It made me feel very nervous, expecting him to say, “let me tell you young lady, this Transition thing is all a load of old rubbish”, and to launch into some great tirade about what a malign influence TTT is on the town.  Eventually we finished our conversation, and she turned to him and asked him what it was he wanted to ask.

“I’m from Braidwood, New South Wales in Australia”, he said, “I am part of the steering group of Transition Braidwood, can you tell me where the TTT office is please?”  Instantly from making a potentially dreadful impression, instantly she had a sense of the scale of interest being generated in other places, and how people visit the place because of its Transition status!  ‘Great British Rail Journeys’ is due to air January/February next year.

This morning’s Guardian [appears to have beaten the rest of the media to the story](http://www.guardian.co.uk/oil/story/0,,2196435,00.html) of the imminent release of a report by the Energy Watch Group which argues that in fact we peaked in 2006, and that annual decline rates from hereonin will be 7% a year. This is chilling stuff. The report, rather than make guesses about total world reserves, focused instead on global production data, which it sees as being a lot more reliable.

Given the EWG’s previous work assessing uranium and coal reserves, room for optimism in the report is also dampened by their forecasts that both of those ‘alternative’ fuels are close to their own peak, and offer no long term solutions. This report will be explosive. Although the article states that it will be released this afternoon in London, the EWG website shows no indication of when it will become available. I’ll let you know as soon as I track it down, as I suspect it will be a ‘must read’.

The report’s author, Joerg Schindler, is quoted as saying, “the world is at the beginning of a structural change of its economic system. This change will be triggered by declining fossil fuel supplies and will influence almost all aspects of our daily life.” However, this rising oil price is, ultimately, great news. I am reminded of this quote from Ted Trainer in his essential book [Renewable Energy Cannot Sustain a Consumer Society](http://www.springer.com/east/home/generic/order?SGWID=5-40110-22-173696952-0);

>“If a significant petroleum crunch occurs, as is very likely, that will concentrate minds wonderfully. We are so extremely dependent on petroleum that any significant increase in scarcity or price will surely jolt people into the realization that radically different social arrangements will be turned to. Without petrol it will be glaringly obvious that only localized economies will make sense”.

EWG founder and German MP Hans-Josef Fell is quoted in the Guardian as saying “Tony Blair and Gordon Brown have talked a lot about climate change but have not brought in proper policies to drive up the use of renewables. This is why they are left talking about nuclear and carbon capture and storage”.

I refuse to see this report as bad news though. It is chilling, and it gives no further room for putting doing things off for a few more months while we get one more cheap flight to Prague in, but it is, ultimately good news. The Oil Age has brought many benefits, but mostly to us in the world’s wealthier nations, and at a huge cost. As the Big Melt study set out, we need to cut emissions to zero yesterday, and if the EWG report is correct, the illusion that we can choose what we do at this point just crumbled to dust. We need to plan now for contraction, for relocalisation and for a decoupling of happiness and economic wellbeing from the amount of fossil fuels we consume. Lester Brown’s concept of a ‘wartime mobilisation’ keeps returning to the front of my mind, we need this, but clearly cannot wait for Governments to do this.

David Strahan’s [recent interview with Robert Hirsch](http://www.davidstrahan.com/blog/?p=63#more-63) is also essential listening, Hirsch argues that peak oil means peak economy, that once we pass the peak the economy contracts in line with the depletion rate. The rebuilding of local resilience is key and is of the utmost urgency, and the viral spread of the Transition concept is evidence of the hunger out there for facing this problem with creativity rather than denial. As these two great issues accelerate before our eyes, we can choose to, as I did as a child watching Dr Who, hide behind the sofa waiting until the scary bits are past, or read what’s happening as the best opportunity we have ever had to actually get to work and rebuild local economies, bringing people together again and starting to relearn the essential skills we will need. As the great South African poet Mark Mzwake put it “Now is the Time”.

We are delighted to be able to offer a full-time position as part of the **Transition Network**, to help support the organisation through its viral growth across the UK and beyond. Below is a short description of the post, for more information contact Ben Brangwyn (email address below).

**OFFICE ADMINISTRATOR.**

Our exciting new national charity, Transition Network, requires an experienced, adaptable and adventurous individual to help set up and manage a busy office.

Transition Network has been set up to inspire, encourage, support, train and network communities to creatively plan their local responses to Peak Oil and Climate Change. Initial funding has been secured from the Tudor Trust and Esmee Fairbairn.

Reporting directly to the Chief Executive, you’ll be expected to handle the demanding role of office administrator with a meticulous eye for detail and the no-nonsense efficiency of a seasoned diplomat.

Your IT skills (MS Office) will be highly valued, as will your ability to set up procedures around cash, diaries, post and office supplies. Experience in running events or conferences will be a distinct advantage.

The role may involve periodic travel around the UK.

Contract: initially for 12 months
Hours: 37.5 weekly
Salary: £15k (1% paid in Totnes Pounds)
Location: central Totnes
Interviews: week commencing 19-November.

Preference will be given to low carbon commuters.
Please send your CV by email by November 5th, explaining why you’d make a great addition to our team to: benbrangwyn@transitionnetwork.org

The team has now completed the first stage of the pilot OVAs for two Totnes businesses: Rumour Wine Bar & Bistro in the High Street; and Coloursworks Print & Design Ltd on the Industrial Estate. This work has seen Simon, Fiona & team work closely with the companies to (1) understand the business (2) identify its activities and business processes (3) establish the resources used in each activity including staff, consumables, raw materials, utilities, overheads etc and (4) calculate the costs of each resource.

The resources, and their associated costs, are then tagged as being ‘oil vulnerable’ if they fall into one of the following categories: direct use of energy (for power or heat); liquid fuel (for transport); are made directly from petrochemicals (such as chemicals); are man-made (nylon, plastics etc.); or if they are a finished good or component that includes products from previous categories (e.g. rubber gloves, or plastic window frames). Then within an activity, the % of those costs that are tagged as vulnerable indicate the Oil Vulnerability Ratio of an activity or a business process.

With each business, we focused on a certain part of the operations in order to make the scope manageable. For Rumour we looked at their A la Carte food operation (i.e. not pizza or drinks) and for Colourworks we looked at all the business activities required to deliver the needs of their largest customer. Within Rumour the key findings were that (unsurprisingly) the ingredients and Preparation/Cooking process was their largest risk area given the quantity of oil that goes to food production (fertilizers, production and farm processes) and distribution – with 45% of A la Carte costs vulnerable to oil price changes. It was also found that 70% of ingredients came from overseas although all were bought locally. For Colourworks the main area of vulnerability by far was with paper, and the Print process – with 35% of costs for this one customer being oil price vulnerable.

For both, the next largest area of vulnerability was their staff, particularly skilled employees such as Print Minders. This increased the cost vulnerability by around 30% for Colourworks and 10% for Rumour As transport costs rise this directly impacts each employee’s living costs (not just petrol/travel but also energy costs, price of food etc.) and puts increasing pressure on salaries. The issues of local, affordable housing and food, and having appropriate skills within an affordable commute will increasingly play a role in business resilience.

We then explored the impact of cost increases in these key resources on profit margins, and also how far prices to customers may need to increase to compensate for these rising costs. Interestingly, energy (gas and electricity) was not a highly significant risk for either as it was a small part of the overall costs for both at <3%. However energy efficiency is still essential in order to minimize exposure to price rises, especially as this is where oil price increases are felt the quickest.

Our presentation of the initial findings to the business owners was very well received. Our next stage is to explore further the links between these key resources and the oil price to establish the level of connection and interaction. The link between oil price and price of other energy sources, including renewables, will be researched to establish level of market integration, i.e. as the oil price goes up, will the prices of non-oil energies track with similar increases (some just because they can)? If so, then switching to green energy may not give the expected protection against cost increases (but of course is essential for carbon emission reductions and the compelling fact that it is the only feasible long-term solution). We aim to complete this research stage by the end of the year.

We are continuing our work to involve the business community further in TTT projects in order to understand better the interactions between jobs, employees, suppliers, customers, housing, skills, food and transport. Only by working as an integrated community can we build the resilience we need to withstand the economic, social and environmental impacts of post-peak oil and climate change, and to achieve a way of life potentially better and more rewarding than that of today.

More detailed case studies will be available shortly. For more information on OVA or other business related TTT projects, please contact FionaWardttt@googlemail.com

A few months later GPM [interviewed Catherine Dunne](http://globalpublicmedia.com/catherine_dunne_transition_design), who, along with Louise Rooney were driving the process that led to the formation of Transition Town Kinsale along at that time. There is also [an interview with me](http://globalpublicmedia.com/rob_hopkins_on_energy_descent_and_action_plans) that looks at how the KEDAP came about, and the broader Transition concept. Now Klaus’s piece brings the story up to date. It gives a strong sense of the activities taking place, the inspiration that the original KEDAP is still providing, but is also honest about the difficulties of trying to live up to the reputation that the town developed on the back of the Plan. A fascinating update to the Kinsale story which is well worth a listen.

A while ago I told you about [an interview I had done with Global Public Media](http://globalpublicmedia.com/rob_hopkins_on_the_transition_movement) which explored in depth the Transition concept. In the meantime, the very noble Kristin Sponsler has actually gone through it and transcribed the whole thing. I thought you might find it of interest… Many thanks to Andy, Julian and the GPM team for making it available.

**AH: This is Andi Hazelwood for Global Public Media on the 11th of July 2007, and I’m speaking with Rob Hopkins of transitionculture.org. Rob, thanks again for talking to me this week.**

RH: It’s always a delight.

**AH: A couple of weeks ago, we briefly spoke about how to start an energy descent action plan to wean a town off fossil fuels, and you and your students developed the very first plan in Kinsale, Ireland. But now you are actually refining the model elsewhere. Can you tell us about Totnes?**

RH: Well, it’s part of the project, which is called Transition Town Totnes, which is the first of these transition initiatives in the U.K., which started really in September of last year, September of ‘06. And it was after we did the planning in Kinsale that plan generated a huge amount of interest and enthusiasm all over the place. I don’t think when we wrote it that we really appreciated the relevance and the importance of what we had done, but lots of other people started appreciating that and downloading it lots of times and started to do their own plans based on it and saying how important they thought it was.

When we started to do Transition Town Totnes our aim was to do a much deeper and more thorough version of what we had really piloted in Kinsale. So Transition Town Totnes really sort of set out with the beginning principle that a future with less oil could be better than the present if we could prepare for it sufficiently in advance with enough imagination, creativity, and I like to use the term “unlocking the collective genius” of a community. And so we started the very first year with the awareness-raising stage of showing films such as the End of Suburbia, that kind of thing, and that led up to September of last year what we called the official unleashing of Transition Town Totnes, which is designed to be the evening that everybody will look back to historically as the point that the whole process began.

Since then it has gone on to become quite an extraordinary movement in the town and it has also inspired another twenty Transition Towns at this stage and another ninety who are sort of chewing over the process. And really what it is about is acting as a catalyst for the towns to start thinking about and planning for life beyond oil. So it is not a process that comes along with all the answers. It is a process which is about getting people to thinking about the right questions. So a lot of the projects that are being developed under the Transition Town Totnes banner include the Energy Descent Plan I think that we actually tried to trigger and then support rather than drive ourselves.

**AH: You started off in Totnes. You just moved into the town and then you started making things happen. Did you actually know anybody before you got there?**

RH: I knew a few people, and there were certain key allies who I guess were already in place. Schumacher College, who are sort of an international college of sustainability, were here, and we forged some very useful alliances with them, which enabled us to be able to borrow a lot of the speakers that they had, and so we had access to some quite amazing speakers. But other than that, no, not really. I mean, I knew a couple of people, and we started networking quite quickly really. I mean there were certain people, and we started doing talks, and we started showing films, and people started coming to those, and we began to take their email contacts, and to build up an email list to start contacting everybody. So at the beginning there were only a few people, but now we have like 10 percent of the population of the town on our email mailing list.

**AH: Wow!**

RH: And we easily get for big events three or four hundred people, and regularly two hundred people. And people say how many people are involved in it? And it’s so hard to gauge, because it’s gone so sort of deep and broad, with all the different working groups that there are, and it’s very very hard to tell. I mean there are different ways that you can sort of assess the degree of support, but what we’re about to do is to launch a membership drive. We’re setting up Transition Town Totnes as a community-owned company, and we’ll be running a membership drive for that so we’ll have a much more tangible way of saying this is the Transition Town Totnes community or whatever.

**AH: And how big is the town of Totnes? What’s the population?**

RH: It’s about 8000 people, but in some of the other places who we doing this now, you know we’ve got the city of Bristol, which is 800,000 people, and then we’ve got places that are smaller little villages and then we’ve got places as big as Bristol. So it’s very interesting the spectrum of places who are getting involved in this process.

**AH: And Totnes now has a local currency. Was that your first Transition project in Totnes?**

RH: It wasn’t the first project, but it certainly is the one that has really grasped the imagination more than a lot of other ones, and the media coverage has been quite extraordinary. There was a big piece about it in the Buenos Aires Herald the other day, and it really has got all over the place. It’s called the Totnes pound. I heard the economist Bernard Lietaer, who wrote The Future of Money, speaking at Schumacher College a year or so ago, and he said two things that really stuck with me. He said that you cannot do relocalisation just with a national currency. You have to have a local currency, a parallel currency, to run complementary to that.

Then the other thing was that that currency has to be designed from the outset so that business will use it, which is always one of the weak points with LETS. LETS schemes tend to just circulate around among citizens rather than involving business. So the Totnes pound, to begin with, what we did was we just we sort of have this philosophy here, well let’s just have a go and see what happens. And we printed 300 notes, and one side of the notes was a facsimile replica of an 1810 Totnes pound, when actually banks in Totnes issued their own money, it’s not like it’s a brand new idea, it’s part of the historical continuum really, a town producing its own money.

So one side has this note and the other side had a list of twenty shops in the town that had agreed to take this note as being worth a pound. So we had an evening on economics to launch our economic livelihood group, and we presumed that it’s probably rather difficult to get people off their sofas to come to an evening about economics, it’s not the most engaging subject quite often, so everybody who came got one of these pounds, everybody got a free pound, and then they were in circulation for four months. And the shopkeepers loved them, and the people loved them, and tourists loved them, and we did a lot of research at the end about how people had found it. So then we’ve just launched a few weeks ago the second phase, where we’ve actually printed ten thousand Totnes pounds and put them into circulation. And they’re smaller notes, and they’ve got lots of different security features on them, and the idea is with these ones is that people actually buy them into circulation. So you pay £9.50 and you get 10 Totnes pounds.

It’s modelled on the Berkshires currency in Massachusetts in the U.S., but really what its about is getting people used to attributing a value to local currency, and building that sort of economic resilience where you have a currency that can just cycle round and round and round. And so within the first two weeks of having launched the scheme, there’s three and half thousand already gone into circulation that people have bought, and that are already going round. So what we’d like to do if it works, is to then produce a full spectrum of notes, ones, fives, ten, twenties, fifties, and then we’d run a whole competition over whose heads should be on the notes, who are the five most notable historical Totneningens whose heads should be on the notes.

But it’s really interesting that we’ve now got seventy businesses in the town that will now take them as being worth a pound, and we’ve set up an advisory panel to support it with Richard Douthwaite and Bernard Lietaer and various experts on this whole thing and we’re saying, “Are we actually allowed to do this?” And nobody really knows, and as long as the notes don’t pretend to be sterling notes, and you don’t put the Queen on them, and you don’t talk about the Bank of England on them and stuff, there doesn’t seem to be any reason why you can’t do it. So it’s all very interesting, and what’s been particularly interesting is that more people know about the Totnes pound within the town than know about Transition Town Totnes. So as a sort of a way of communicating the ideas of what we’re doing, and informing people about TTT, it’s been very powerful.

**AH: So having a physical thing that people can take away with them makes the big difference.**

RH: Yeah, I think that it’s very important that these kinds of initiatives develop as visible practical manifestations quite early on, so then people can say, “Ah, that’s what you’re doing.” And it can be tree planting, or a lot of things that other groups do, but for us it’s really been the Totnes pound that’s been the thing that’s put us on the map in that sense.

**AH: Now obviously the Transition concept has become very well developed over the past couple of years. We’ve got the Head, Heart, and Hands of Energy Descent, the criteria for joining the Transition Network, the 12 Steps of Transition, and of course the 7 Buts. All of these are available on transitiontowns.org. How did they evolve over that time?**

RH: Well they evolved really because, I suppose, what we did in Kinsale and what we were doing in Totnes we weren’t really following a template for. We weren’t really following a map. There were certain things that we were inspired by, the Natural Step for Communities material, Richard Heinberg’s Powerdown book, David Holmgren’s work on Energy Descent Pathways and so on, but what we really wanted was kind of a guide for how to do this on a community level, and we couldn’t find anything. After we’d been going with Totnes for a little while, people from other communities started to come up to us and say, “How do you do that?”

And at that point we had to sort of stop and try to think, “Well, actually, what are we doing? And what are the things that seem to have worked?” So the 12 Steps of Transition are the things that seem to have worked and seem to have got us through the first six months to a year, but they’re not prescriptive as in in order to do this you must do Step 1, and then when you’ve finished that you do Step 2 and so on. All the different communities who are doing this are interpreting them in their own ways and using them as relatively loose guidelines and assembling them in different ways and even not doing all of them necessarily. But they seem to have something to them which people find useful.

The 7 Buts is basically just trying to identify the ways we try and talk ourselves out of doing things. “Oh, we can’t do a Transition Town because we haven’t got any money.” Well, that doesn’t really matter, we’ve done everything that we’ve done for this year in Transition Town Totnes without any money from anywhere, it’s all been self-funded. “Well, we can’t do it because…” So I think it’s really important to voice those as well. They’re really just sort of loose guidelines and things that are hopefully helpful, but yeah, as you say now with the Transition Network we’re really trying to refine that model as best we can so there’s as much guidance for communities wanting to start this process as possible.

**AH: Now I notice that one of the criteria for joining the Transition Network is for team members to go to Totnes for training. At that point were you expecting to receive so much interest from all over the world?**

RH: Not at all, really. It’s really been quite extraordinary, and it’s actually, I think for many years doing environmental work and trying to get things moving it always felt like trying to push a broken-down car up a hill. You know, you’re putting in so much effort, and not getting very far, it actually felt at times like it was slipping back on top of you. Now, with this work, it really feels like you’ve got over the top of the hill and the car’s gone careering off and you’re chasing after it trying to keep up. And actually there’s so much interest in it that we have funding now to start some of the Transition work.

We have produced a booklet called a Transition Primer, which is the basic information about how to do it. And I’m writing a book, due out early 2008, which is going to be called The Transition Handbook, which is going to be the how and why book about the Transition approach. So, we’re really trying to put in place the infrastructure so we’ll really be able to support people and that idea of people coming to Totnes to train is really part of the bigger scale thing called Transition Training, which is to make available to the communities the training that they will need.

One of the key roles of Transition Network is to offer training, because one of the things that became very clear here in Totnes was just because people have the energy and enthusiasm and the drive to manage one of the working groups or to get involved, doesn’t necessarily mean that they have the skills in holding meetings, it doesn’t necessarily they have the skills in terms of conflict resolution, and all these kinds of things, so here in Totnes we’ve put training as one of the big things, and we offer training to the different group facilitators and so on, and I think that’s a very important model on a national scale too.

**AH: And you’ve also started producing YouTube videos for kind of a remote training.**

RH: Well, YouTube is fantastic. I mean one of the things that I was really disappointed by was that during the very first year of Transition Town Totnes there was nobody documenting what we were doing. I mean, I’ve still got some photographs and I wrote a lot of it up, but there was nobody making any sort of film document of what was happening and there was this extraordinary process that was unfolding here and it seemed like a real missed opportunity. And various people said, oh yes, yes, we’d like to make a film about this, and they didn’t get the funding, or whatever for one reason or another. The beauty with YouTube is that you can make films so easily and so cheaply and you can post them up on the Internet.

We ran a course here recently with a guy called Keith Ellis from Transition Town Lewes in Sussex, who made the first Transition Town-related film that was put on the Internet, which was kind of at trailer for Transition Town Lewes’ unleashing event, which the local cinema showed as a trailer for every film in the three months up until their unleashing. And he made that film just on his laptop. So he came down here and he ran a one-day course on how to make films and put them on YouTube. And all those films that were made on the course are now on YouTube. But we’re really trying to get people here to start documenting these processes using that because it’s such a lovely, accessible, democratic way of communicating ideas really.

**AH: Now let’s go back and talk about those 7 Buts, because these are common struggles for many relocalization groups regardless of where they are in the world. You’ve already covered the funding issue. Let’s just go through them briefly. They won’t let us…**

RH: They won’t let us… well you hear it quite a lot, and I did a talk yesterday where somebody said “Have there attempts to sabotage what you’re doing?” Actually, I think our sort of mindset in the environmental movement is a sort of bunker mentality that somewhere there’s a smoke-filled room where people are working out how to scupper what we’re trying to do, and I don’t think that’s really a concern. Because I think at this stage the people who are decision makers and so on are desperate for good ideas, and my experience has been completely the opposite.

That actually local government and national government are absolutely desperate, and the Transition Town concept really fits right in there, because it is modelling solutions on the ground, it is creating a degree of engagement which politicians can only dream of, generally. But also it’s something which avoids from the outset any sense of them and us. We’re not looking at anybody to blame, everybody’s in the same boat, and actually what we need is Lester Brown’s concept of a wartime mobilization. We need to be bringing together disparate groups who have never had that much to do with each other before. And that really requires a lot of humility and no finger-pointing, and that I think that is something that we’ve been doing quite well.

**AH: And when people say there are already green groups in town, I don’t want to step on their toes, what’s your response?**

RH: Yeah, that’s the one you hear people say quite often, “Well, there’s already people here doing things, and the last thing anybody wants is yet another environmental organization popping up to do A, B, C, and D.” And actually my experience is that quite often in towns you might have one or two environmental groups, and it is often in the nature of environmental organizations to all sort of fall out with each other and form smaller and smaller groups.

So quite often what you wind up with is lots of small groups, some of whom are very dynamic, some of whom are rather running out of steam, and the experience here is that actually the Transition Town process rather than coming in and replicating what any of those groups are doing comes in as a sort of unifying umbrella which then invites all these different organizations to participate in this adventure, and that’s worked really really well. And we’ve really tried to involve and draw in all the different environmental groups into this process, and I think that’s been really successful. If you can pitch it right, then you’ll have a process in which they’ll all take a delight in really.

**AH: What happens when you’ve got the opposite, when it seems that nobody in town cares about the environment at all?**

RH: Yeah, I think that can be an easy perception to have. I think that depends very much on how we interpret interest in the environment, and most towns would have people who would be interested in lots of the different aspects of what a Transition Town is looking at. They just may not attribute an environmental label to it. They may be incredibly passionate about local food, they may be incredibly passionate about the development of local community, about local economy, and the preservation of the woodlands, about strengthening local business. There are different things that you can use to draw in different people, and I think that lots of people are already very involved and hungry for different aspects of this, they just haven’t attributed a sort of Transition label to it. And it’s extraordinary actually I think here, the number of people from completely different backgrounds who are getting involved in this process.

**AH: And is it too late at this point to do anything?**

RH: Yeah, that’s the next one. People say that quite a lot, “Yeah, but we’ve had it, haven’t we, climate change, runaway climate change, really we’re sunk, and there’s nothing we can do.” And maybe we are, but actually, I think it’s really important to live as if we’re not, because actually if we decide we are, then we are, really. And I don’t have much time for this sort of resigned fatalist position, and I think one of the things that we try to do with Transition Town is really to communicate a sense of great positivity around all of this. I always like the quote that Vandana Shiva uses, “The uncertainty of our times is no reason to be certain about hopelessness.”

**AH: Yeah, that’s a good one. You are actually getting your Ph.D. based on the Energy Descent Plan. What about people who think they don’t have the right qualifications for this?**

RH: Well, there isn’t actually a degree in transition planning. Sometimes I wish there was one in some ways. Really there is no qualification for doing this. Actually all you need to really kick this process off is the passion to want to do it, I think, and to not be a control freak. If you’re a control freak, it’s a very distressing process because it will go off in all different kinds of directions and do all different things you didn’t expect it to.

I think it’s very important, the reason that that is one of the 7 Buts is that we’ve become such an expert-driven culture, and that we feel that we can’t do anything unless a relevant expert has come and run us down with what we’re doing. I think that part of what has been delightful with seeing this process is actually seeing the people who’ve come to the fore and started to drive it forward. It’s such a diverse and disparate group and what they have in common is that they’re really passionate about this process, passionate about where they live, and that’s really the only qualification that you need.

**AH: So in that case you shouldn’t be hearing from anybody that’s saying the Seventh But, which is “But I don’t have the energy for that.”**

RH: I think that people can look at what work is required when what you need to do is to power down your entire community. Oh my God, I can’t do that, that’s just so exhausting! But actually what happens in my experience and in the experience of a lot other places and a lot of other Transition initiatives is once you start this process, it unleashes the most incredible amount of energy and serendipity as well. You know so often I find myself thinking is what we really need there is someone who knows about whatever, and then the next day they turn up. And a lot of the towns who start this process get back to me after a few days and say, “God, what have we started here? The amount of energy and people who come forward and who want to do things!” It’s not something where if you start this process you will be expected to carry the entire thing on your shoulders. People will come, people will get involved, the energy will be generated, and you will find yourself being carried along this path. It’s something really quite extraordinary.

**AH: Now as I understand it you started down this path to Transition specifically because of Peak Oil. But have more people become interested in transitioning since climate change has become such a mainstream issue in the last couple of years?**

RH: Yeah, I mean I think we very much put the two as being of equal weight, and you can’t really look at one without the other. What we’re developing with Transition Towns that’s really interesting is the idea of moving beyond carbon footprinting. Carbon footprinting is a really useful tool, and it’s a very good way of indicating what direction you’re moving, but equally as important is the building of resilience, building the town’s ability to look after itself, building the town’s ability to withstand shock from outside.

We’re looking at this concept of resilience indicators, where once you develop an energy descent plan, you can pull out a series of key indicators that show that you’re moving toward a more resilient economy. So that’s something that I think is going to be really really key, because it’s perfectly possible that you could actually halve the carbon footprint of your town and not increase its resilience at all. In the context of peak oil, the building of resilience is really really essential. But in terms of what the issue is that has most drawn people into the process I would say it’s probably 50-50. But I’ve found that certainly Peak Oil is a more useful issue for really drawing people into this because it’s so powerful at putting a mirror up to the community and asking where its resilience has gone. People can instinctively understand, when you ask the question, “Can you imagine this community without…?”, you can really see how they entertain all the different aspects of what we do. Financially it’s a very powerful tool and it’s been very effective here in that way.

**AH: Some people say, well Peak Oil is just going to take care of climate change itself. What’s your response to that?**

RH: I think the opposite is true, because in order to actually deal with climate change you need a completely unprecedented international scale response. You need a lot of money being put into solving it, and actually the danger is, as Richard Heinberg argues well in his Oil Depletion Protocol, once you hit the peak, and you haven’t prepared for it, then the kind of economic effects that you have and the knock-on effect you have around the world, the recession and so on, means that actually climate change very rapidly drops off the agenda.

The only way that you’re actually going to have a sustained response to climate change is to keep the economy stable, which you can only do if you really prepare for Peak Oil. And actually, of course, the danger as well is that once you hit Peak Oil, it’s not that therefore all the fossil fuels disappear from your life, it’s that we just start burning more coal. And that’s the real danger, if we panic and we turn to coal, then we basically take on the challenge of proving all the world’s climate scientists wrong, and it’s not really a challenge that we want to embark on really.

**AH: There are reports that are starting to pop up that are negating some of the things that we’re doing. They say local food may not require less energy than imported food, that relocalization goals are impractical, that this is bad for the economy. How do we respond to those arguments?**

RH: I can’t imagine how that’s based, really. I mean I think there are some arguments that actually if we wanted to grow tomatoes all year round in Devon, the amount of energy that it would require would be far far more than what it would take to truck them here from Spain, for example. But actually we don’t need tomatoes all year round. Maybe we have tomatoes when tomatoes are in season. For me it’s a logical thing. It’s not that we’re saying that we’re going to put an enormous fence up around Totnes and not allow anything in or anything out.

Also I’m not of a degree of naivete that thinks that within the next two years we are going to get everybody in Totnes growing their own carrots. I think that what this is very much about is like the concept that Julian Darley uses of a public parallel infrastructure. What we’re trying to do is to build around people what will be needed in such a way that it’s not threatening, that it’s fun, that it’s seen as a positive step forward. We’re putting that stuff in place because that’s what is really going to be needed in a more resilient situation. And it may be that all those arguments about the efficiency of the globalised system really unravel very very quickly when you run the oil price up.

What has been very interesting here in Totnes, looking back over the history of the town, up until the 60s and 70s there were within the town four big market gardens. Most of the car parks within the town of Totnes used to be working commercial market gardens that were linked to shops on the high street, and it was a model then when we were talking about food feet, not about food miles. And those systems became obsolete when the amount of cheap oil in the economy was such that they just became irrelevant. But I think the logic for me is that once the price of oil starts to rise again, it becomes more and more expensive to import food from outside, then the rebuilding of that local infrastructure becomes essential. There’ll always be some trade, but the more we can produce locally is really going to be what supports us, I think.

**AH: And that respect for elders and getting that information from the past is something that’s very important to the Transition movement, isn’t that correct?**

RH: It is very much, yeah. I think there is something inherently respectful about starting this process of going to the elders and asking for their memories and their thoughts, but you also find the most incredible amounts of information when you do that. All this stuff we’ve been finding out about the history of food production in the area has comes from those. You also find out about the staggering amount of skills people had in their daily lives which we’ve just lost. And those oral histories have been really really key parts of what we’re doing.

**AH: And that’s actually a fantastic way, because there is no blueprint for this, that’s the best way to find out what your local area was good at or did in the past that you can do now.**

RH: Absolutely, and you know with this idea of powerdown, we need to have the powerdown and so on, well actually in World War II in the U.K. we had a powerdown. It was our most recent historical powerdown, and there’s a huge amount we can learn from that. What were the organisations, what were the networks, what did they do, how did they all pull together, where was the food grown, and unfortunately we find that a lot of the best places for growing food are under a few inches of tarmac at this point, or worse, have been built on. But you do find out a huge amount of stuff that’s really really useful.

**AH: So Rob what’s next on your list, what’s next for you?**

RH: Well, I am going to finish this book, that’s got to be done by the middle of October. We’re planning the next program for September for Transition Town Totnes. We’re planning a big celebration for the first year of the project. And I seem to be being pulled more and more into work through the Network, of first communicating the idea, and what’s very interesting at the moment is that many of the contacts that we’re getting about this are coming from local governments and councillors who are saying how do we make this process start where we are?

I know that it’s a process that councils can’t really drive, that their role is to support rather than to drive these things, but that said, that’s a whole area that we’re really looking into. But I guess like I said with the analogy with the car, I suppose what’s next for me is just trying to keep up! Seeing that when we started, we didn’t really sort of appreciate the energy in it, it really does sort of seem like the right idea at the right time and people are starting to respond to it very positively all over the place. It’s quite extraordinary.

**AH: Is there anything else you’d like to add?**

RH: I suppose to just keep an eye on transitionculture.org, really, which is where a lot of these ideas are sort of chewed around and that people will find that a sort of useful resource. And also the work that we’ve been doing here really draws a lot of inspiration from people all over the world like Richard Heinberg’s work and David Holmgren and the work that Julian Darley’s been doing in Post Carbon, too. It feels to me like whether it’s called Transition Towns or Post Carbon Outposts or all these different things around the world, I think that actually what we’re looking at with communities looking at this and moving in this direction with such energy is really one of the most important social and political movements of the 21st century.

I think it has the potential to be that anyway, because it’s really trying to overcome the fracture in politics where citizens think that politicians don’t care, and politicians think that citizens are apathetic, and at a time when democracy should be the tool that is really energizing people preparing for the biggest transition that we’ve ever had to go through, just an unprecedented gale of challenge and urgency, our decision making processes just aren’t in touch with it. So the degree of engagement that Transition initiatives can create and the degree of response that they can create for local government is I think something really powerful and very exciting and I think we’ve only just started to scratch the surface of it and it’s certainly very exciting to be a part of it, to see what comes forth when that creativity is unleashed really.

**AH: transitionculture.org is the website. Rob Hopkins, thank you very much.**

RH: Thank you very much, Andi.

**AH: This is Andi Hazelwood for Global Public Media.**

**Bringing together ideas from around the world by Sonya Wallace.**

I don’t know about you, but I’m really concerned about climate change and peak oil. I mean really concerned – lay awake at night concerned.

Sometimes I feel like I’m the only person who is, but it doesn’t take long on the laptop to find plenty of other people who feel the same way.

I find inspiration browsing through my list of favourites and seeing all the other individuals and groups who are trying their hardest to do something and to make changes despite, at times, immense opposition and apathy.

These sites have become places of inspiration and kinship for me even when I don’t know the people involved. When I feel like giving up, a quick connection to the www and there they all are – busy networking, educating, offering their skills and time and most importantly of all inspiring others all hours of the day and night, every day of the year.

It’s heartening to know that around the globe people are joining together and starting to generate positive action focussed on local, practical solutions.

Like me, people are being buoyed along by texts such as Powerdown and the Oil Depletion Protocol by Richard Heinberg, groups such as the Post Carbon Institute and Community Solutions, site like this one and, particularly for me personally, the work of people like David Holmgren in Australia and Rob Hopkins in the UK.

Now some communities and councils are starting to plan, prepare and make changes for a positive post carbon future thanks to the words and actions of these leaders. More and more groups are coming online all the time and there would be a whole lot more who are online, but are still working very hard in their own communities to get action moving forward.

Here on the Sunshine Coast in Queensland Australia, things seem fine and dandy, we worship the sun and surf, we celebrate our coastal lifestyle – the envy of many who make this their holiday destination year after year.

We enjoy good rainfall at our place despite the rest of the country being in a severe drought. Our rainwater tanks are full, our soil here on our little farm is excellent and full of organic matter, plants grow overnight in our subtropical climate, our chooks enjoy a diet better than most humans thanks to our excess. We have plenty of fresh organic food to eat, clean water to drink, and the air is clean and clear.

Which makes it so much harder to convince people this is under threat and is going to change unless we do something NOW.

We are vulnerable, our food supply is fragile, water is wasted in irresponsible and immoral ways, solutions from government are ludicrous at best, downright dangerous at worst.

Not being one to sit around and complain – well, not much and not without coming up with some sort of solution eventually – a couple of us, both with permaculture backgrounds, got together to try to come up with a solution.

But what could I offer. My background is in corporate communications, strategic planning and crisis management within government agencies and universities, I left full-time work last year to put my time and energy into permaculture. Rather than ignoring my ‘past life’ skills, I’ve decided to embrace them and use them to communicate as best I can about these critical issues.

After years as a ‘book permaculturist’, that is reading all I could about the concept, I finally completed my Permaculture Design Certificate (PDC) last year with local Sunshine Coast permaculture educator and now my mentor, Janet Millington.

The PDC uses Bill Mollison’s text: Permaculture, A Designer’s Manual, as its basis and applies permaculture principles to the landscape to create sustainable human settlements – needs such as food, water, shelter and energy are all addressed in a way that not only complements but also aims to improve the land.

Just prior to my PDC I attended a presentation by David Holmgren, co-originator of permaculture, at the local university. He spoke about ‘regional sustainability in an energy descent future’ and mentioned the Kinsale model of action planning – he inspired me to ‘do something’.

Also, Andi Hazelwood from Global Public Media was in my PDC group and she spoke about relocalisation and I started a group in my local area.

Dots were starting to join up for me. Solutions were on the horizon. There was light at the end of the tunnel and it wasn’t a train!

Reading Holmgren’s book, I found his seven domains of action compelling. It addresses everything we need to fix. the built environment, tools and technology, culture and education, health and spiritual wellbeing, finances and economics, land tenure and community governance and land and nature stewardship.

Here was the basis of the practical framework we needed for social reorganisation to prepare for energy descent. Excellent, the blueprint was there, all we had to do was put it into action.

With the support and guidance of Janet and her expertise in curriculum development, we began working together, fleshing out a course that would apply Holmgren’s principles to regional energy descent preparedness.

I discovered Rob Hopkins’s Skilling Up for Powerdown course on the internet and we used that as a model for a course focusing on climate change and peak oil. We were on our way…

**The course**

So, the Time for an Oil Change course began to really take shape. The trial 10-week course started in July this year.

Each week we examine an area of our society that will be affected by energy descent. Each issue is discussed as to how it applies to our region specifically and how we can use permaculture to not only survive, but thrive. Permaculture principles are applied each week to determine the feasibility of solutions. We will look at – what is the current situation, what is the ideal situation and how do we get there?

Similar to the Skilling Up for Powerdown course, but specific to our region, weekly sessions cover;
Week 1 Social breakdown or social breakthrough? Permaculture, climate change and peak oil.
Week 2 You can’t work on an empty stomach – food production and supply, school and community gardens, home food production, community support agriculture.
Week 3 Waste not, want not – water, energy and waste management – household to bio-regional levels
Week 4 Setting foundations for the future – infrastructure and transportation, using existing oil supplies to the best advantage to prepare for the post-carbon future.
Week 5 A roof over our heads – new homes and retrofitting older homes, materials, developments, local industries
Week 6 Healthy communication – health systems, community health issues, hospital and emergency services, communication systems, information retrieval
Week 7 You can teach an old dog new tricks – education, re-skilling,
Week 8 Money, money, money – economics, finances, employment
Week 9 Finding common ground – community governance, land stewardship, public land use, community development, emergency preparedness.
Week 10 From little things big things grow – attitudes personal and community, future strategies and outcomes – where to from here?

**Energy Descent Action Plan**

Throughout the course, students work on developing individual and group projects as installments of the first Sunshine Coast Energy Descent Action Plan, and we have the support of our local council for this plan.

While developing the course it soon became apparent that we needed ongoing support for students to continue to progress the EDAP after the 10-week course. I didn’t like the idea of getting people all fired up and then not giving them an avenue to use that energy and to try out their ideas.

Also, I volunteer every Saturday morning at our local community gardens and I found visitors there were starting to link home food production with energy and water issues (we are currently on water restrictions with Australia in the midst of an extended period of drought). Offering the community the chance to learn more about energy and water issues from a permaculture perspective was appealing and the idea for the Sunshine Coast Energy Action Centre was born.

**A community education centre is born**

The Sunshine Coast Energy Action Centre (SEAC) operates out of an old Queenslander (a timber house built off the ground, common here in Queensland). The house is at our one and only community garden here on the Sunshine Coast.

SEAC is open every Saturday morning and our aim is to raise awareness in the community about peak oil, energy descent and the positive and practical solutions on offer.

With my background in communications and community education I’m following the path of; awareness – information – education – action – and hoping it makes a difference.

We run free weekly events including; dvd screenings, we have presentations by guest speakers from sustainable businesses, the local university sustainability section, and from within the permaculture network We offer free workshops (composting, worm farming) and free consultations. The Time for an Oil Change course runs straight after the SEAC information sessions.

My hopes for the Centre is that it becomes a one stop shop of information about action groups and activities on the Sunshine Coast, somewhere people can be inspired and find some respite from the mainstream material world and some hope for the future.

We provide resources and information so visitors can join an existing local group (such as climate change action or a relocalisation group), or – with support and guidance from SEAC – start their own group. Information about permaculture, re-skilling and related courses across the Coast is also available.

We plan to gradually retrofit the old house to demonstrate how that can be done while maintaining a high standard of living within a home. Being sustainable doesn’t mean sitting in the dark, in the cold and being hungry!

We offer the community a range of resources; books, dvds, web addresses, courses (from free community courses right through to university level), networking and social events will be organised with the aim of raising community awareness, informing, educating and empowering and hopefully inspiring the community into action. I hope one day, SEAC will emulate the Solar Living Institute in the US.

Richard Heinberg’s texts; Powerdown and the Oil Depletion Protocol also feature highly at SEAC and I am currently working on developing a way to enable individuals, businesses, organisations, communities, and councils to sign up to the protocol in our region.

**Research**

This all fits with my own personal aims too and a new direction in my life I didn’t expect to be taking. I am doing my Master in Communication, with the support of a great supervisor, and I plan to base my thesis on these projects; how we can best communicate the urgent need for action in the community, while at the same time empowering them into positive solutions rather than alienating them.

I hope to produce a document that is useful and user-friendly to others and can be shared around the place. A document that helps crack that forcefield of apathy in the community and finds ways to make people see the need for urgent and complete action.

Bringing all these ideas from around the world is made possible with time, energy and the internet! By applying permaculture principles to my time and energy – this was the best way for to obtain maximum yield.

I see a future when, as more and more people come ‘on-line’ looking for solutions they will be able to access websites with models of different action approaches from different bio-regions from around the world. A real virtual community of information sharing, support and extraordinary resources.

Being able to pick and choose the most appropriate scenario for their situation and add their own take on what works for them – we will be able to build a useful resource of information while networking and supporting each other as we develop these ideas and work together finding inspiration and information to bring the world into a successful energy descent region by region.

Despite being very concerned, I’m just as hopeful that we as a species can get ourselves out of this mess we’ve created and that we do have a very real chance at making a much better world for generations to come.

For information on the Time for an Oil Change course or SEAC email info@seac.net.au or visit www.seac.net.au

By; Sonya Wallace
SEAC Coordinator
& Relocalisation Coordinator
Queensland Australia

Sonya lives on a couple of acres of permaculture food gardens at Eudlo on the Sunshine Coast, Queensland Australia with her husband John, their dog Barney, a stack of chooks and heaps of other creatures – wild and domestic. Determined to do as much as she possible can in her lifetime to raise awareness about peak oil, climate change, relocalisation and permaculture, Sonya is inspired to keep going by a great mentor, great networks and by her trusty www connections.

Links for further information and inspiration
SEAC www.seac.net.au
David Holmgren www.holmgren.com
Richard Heinberg www.richardheinberg.com
Global Public Media www.globalpublicmedia.com
Oil Depletion Protocol www.oildepletionprotocal.org
Eudlo Relocalisation Group www.relocalize.net/groups/eudlo
Transition Towns UK www.transitionculture.org
Solar Living Institute www.solarliving.org

(What follows is the TTT Press Release for next Wednesday’s talk). Whether you are a newcomer to the peak oil issue, or familiar with the debate and looking to deepen your understanding, this talk by writer, producer, and director **David Strahan** is a great opportunity to find out about the challenges facing a world current overly dependent on oil.

*”David Strahan is a superb journalist, who has written the leading UK book on Peak Oil and we are delighted to invite him to talk here in Totnes. This offers the best chance this year to find out about this hugely important issue,”* comments Rob Hopkins, of Transition Town Totnes.

In his latest book, ‘The Last Oil Shock’ David’s explains that for every barrel of oil we discover, we now consume three. He points out that oil production is already falling in 60 countries, and argues that at some point, probably in the next decade, global oil production will start to fall – for ever. With oil prices hitting a record breaking $83 dollars a barrel last week, this issue is increasingly on many peoples’ minds.

*“This book should be compulsory reading for all those in Government in this and every other significant oil consuming country. Take note and avert the greatest crisis since the Second World War.”* writes Richard Hardman CBE, former head of Exploration at Amerada Hess. You can read a recent interview with David [here](http://zone5.org/2007/09/16/david-strahan-interview-at-cool-earth/)

The evening will also introduce The Carbon Account, an easy-to-use carbon footprint measuring tool, where simply by inputting your vehicle mileage and home energy bills, anyone can build up a detailed picture of their carbon emissions, and where they can be most effectively reduced. Transition Town Totnes is encouraging as many people as possible to make use of this groundbreaking new tool.

**David Strahan’s evening talk, The Last Oil Shock : The Imminent Extinction of Petroleum Man is on Wednesday 3rd October at St John’s Church, Bridgetown, 8pm. Ticket will be £4 (£3 concession). Totnes pounds are accepted at this event.**

**Part One.**

**Part Two.**

**Part Three.**

The evening was introduced by David Horsburgh, the Mayor of Totnes, welcomed everyone to the party. Then Naresh Giangrande and myself gave an overview of the last year, taking people from the Unleashing through to today. Many highlights were picked out from along the journey, such as the woman who was interviewed in the Square in Totnes and asked if she knew what the Totnes Pound was, to which she replied “isn’t that where they take the stray dogs?”. Rob concluded with a toast, “To Transition Town Totnes, to friendship and to the power of hope”.

Then a collection of birthday greetings were read out from many of those who had spoken at TTT events over the past year (these are reproduced below). After the greetings, Sophy Banks of the Heart and Soul group invited people to talk to each other in pairs about their highlights of the year and their visions for the following year. There were then written onto heart shaped post-it notes and stuck onto Sandwich Board Bob as he wandered through the crowd.

This was followed by local comedian/poet, Matt Harvey, who began by announcing that he had been thinking of writing some new material for the evening, but decided that, in the spirit of TTT, he would just recycle some old stuff instead. My favourite joke of his from the evening was “I went to a car boot sale the other day, and I took some Totnes Pounds. I was delighted to find that the stall-holder there would take Totnes Pounds… not in exchange for any goods, they’d just take them….”. He read out various poems and went down a storm.

He then set the competitions for the evening, one which was to answer the question “what would you do with the last barrel of oil?” and the other was to create a poem where each line started with the letters of the name Totnes (first line starts with a T, second with an O.. etc). Rooh Star sang a couple of songs with her beautiful powerful voice, including her ode to compost toilets.

Then, before the break, the amazing TTT birthday cake (see above) was brought out, made by Julia Ponsonby at Schumacher College, 3 cakes adorned with a T, and decorated with marzipan Totnes Pounds. After a rousing ‘Happy Birthday’, the cake was taken to the bar to be devoured, while a slide show of images of the last year played on the back of the stage. During the break people worked on their poems and chatted, and at the end of the break they were read out and prizes given out. The only one I remember was to make it into homeopathic preparations, distilling it millions of times, so that everyone in the world could get some and be able to take it as a remedy when they needed more energy! I think another was to use it to dip seagulls in…

After the break, some human sized chickens went walkabout, there was some improvised comedy, and then Bert Miller and the Animal Folk played to much dancing, the raffle was drawn, and then the evening closed with Poisson Rouge getting everyone doing some Breton dancing. The evening a delightful celebration of the year, with good food, music, dancing and laughter. It was a fitting close to a quite extraordinary year. I’m already looking forward to the second one…

**The TTT Birthday Greetings.**

“Whether we like it or not the world faces a major transition away from dependence on fossil fuels. Either we will decide to manage that transition for the maximum benefit of everyone, or we will be managed by it in a way that is likely to be messy, dangerous and potentially lethal for millions. By taking this initiative, Totnes is leading by example. TTT is a pioneer. It is one of the first beats in a drum roll announcing the arrival of a new era in which we will come to understand that good lives do not have to cost the earth.”

Andrew Simms, policy director New Economics Foundation.

“Congratulations on your first birthday, TTT. Where you blaze the trail many others follow. Here at Transition Town Glastonbury we find your experiences both and inspiration and an education. The wonderful thing about this movement is that it’s not a protest against something, it’s positively working towards something we all want – a sustainable future. Happy Birthday and Many Happy Returns!”

Patrick Whitefield, author and permaculture teacher.

“Transition Town Totnes is a practical expression of a great vision. I am particularly inspired by TTT because it reflects the ideals of non-violent social transformation espoused by Rabindranath Tagore. Tagore came to Totnes in the early 30s and was very impressed with the beauty, tranquillity and spirituality of the place. Tagore was the inspiration behind the establishment of the Dartington Hall Trust. Leonard Elmhurst worked for Tagore in India for several years and now, in an implicit and an indirect way, Tagore’s vision is being realised in Totnes through transition and transformation from a fossil fuel based wasteful way of living to a natural energy based sustainable lifestyle.

TTT is a wonderful example which is stimulating thoughts and actions around Britain. Only through grassroots action and through bottom-up initiatives can we bring about a real and lasting change.

The transformation is not going to come about from the House of Commons, the City or from large corporations; it will come about when people in towns, villages and cities realise that there is a better way to be and live and when they start to live their ideals. The people of Totnes are doing exactly that; you are giving a great hope to us all. I wish you every success!”

Satish Kumar, Schumacher College.

“Hello you TerrificTownsfolk of Totnes

Here is a birthday message from Scotland. According to page 71 of the Penguin Classics version of Geoffrey of Monmouth’s 12th century History of the Kings of Britain, it was at Totnes that Brutus of Troy landed in the 12th Century BC and named Britain after himself. However, we Scots have a disagreement with Brutus. He presumed to place Scotland, or Alba, under the feudal overlordship of his fourth son, Albanactus. It was on this basis that Edward 1 presumed to invade Scotland, thus giving rise to the whole Braveheart thing.

We in Scotland are very pleased, and not a little reassured, to see that Totnes has now moved on from being a Staging Town to a Transition Town. Totnes is now pioneering a new way of relating to this land. The brutal ways of Brutus and even the days of Braveheart must be put behind us all. Violence shaped the past, but nonviolence must fashion the future. Let beauty guide the way forward, and may Totnes be but one of many turning points. Happy Birthday”.

Alastair McIntosh, author of Soil and Soul.

“Transition Town Totnes is much more than simply one of more than 50 Transition initiatives in the UK. It has acquired leadership status and will act as a benchmark for other Transition projects, not only in this country but throughout the world. In my view, the Transition movement is one of the most important developments of the new millennium. It not only addresses climate change and fossil fuel depletion imperatives, but also captures the spirit of a move away from Government and corporate dependency towards individual empowerment. Happy Birthday TTT!”

Patrick Holden, Director, Soil Association.

“To everyone who has helped this vision take form,
Thank you for your commitment to the challenge,
and for the light you shine to others.
May many follow your lead.

Happy Birthday, Transition Town Totnes!”

Peter Russell.

“One year on, and you’ve given inspiration
To a world still anchored in the economic past.
One year on – you’re the first new generation
Of a people in transition and you’re doing it very fast.

Have you forgot what it’s like to work with horses,
How to cultivate the land using muscle-power alone?
Have you forgot how to marshal local forces
To keep things going though you’re down to crust and bone?

Sweet fire of youth, you will carry all before you –
See your way to answers that the establishment would scorn.
Sweet fire of youth, your courage will restore you
To a visionary town amidst its fields of golden corn”.

David Fleming

“Happy Birthday TTT, you’ve certainly been an inspiration for me watching from SW Ireland the growth over the past year of what appears to be the fastest growing environmental movement since the 60s. You have caught the imagination and energy of many people looking for a way forward and will be seen in the future looking back as one of the key initiatives in the transition to a low-energy world. Just remember the future will be one of modest consumption so don’t eat too much cake”.

Graham Strouts, Kinsale, Ireland.

“Here’s my big birthday wishes now that you’re (very soon to be) one year old. I believe that TTs are the single most important thing happening in the UK right now and seeing what’s been happening in Totnes and watch the spread of interest fan out across the UK has been inspirational. As Victor Hugo said, “nothing is so powerful as an idea whose time has come” and the time for TTs is certainly NOW. Happy birthday to you, happy birthday to you”.

Stephen Watson – Transition City Brighton.

“Many happy returns and more of them. You are so important and I hope that the groups in West Wales can keep up with you. It’s going to be a hard slog as a friend of mine said that this is the 21st century and with all the high technology it shouldn’t be a problem. Happy birthday”.

Peter Rout

**Maidenhead’s Future is in Your Hands.** From Business Monthly.

MAIDENHEAD MP Theresa May is backing an initiative to protect the town’s future by turning it into one of the first “Transition
Towns” in the country. The Shadow Leader of the House of Commons has joined forces with environmentalist Vinnie McCann who is getting backing for the scheme which encourages businesses and communities to plan for climate change and a future when oil wells run dry.

The marketing manager of Waltham Place Organic Farm says oil reserves have almost reached their peak and it will be down hill fast. Concerned for the future, he won the support of the MP when he told her how a handful of towns have already embraced it and 50 more are lining up troops to join the battle.

He is also pressing businesses to be involved saying: “There’s a strong business case for adopting more sustainable practices, and it’s gradually finding its way into mainstream business thinking. The emphasis on Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) and triple bottom line accounting – economic, social and environmental – may be steps in the right direction, and carbon trading could yield substantial cuts in global CO2 emissions. “However, none of these address the way that Peak Oil will make itself felt on businesses that have long supply chains, or serve markets in distant locales.”

Mrs May agrees with him that Maidenhead should be involved and said: “We need to take both climate change and the future of our energy supply seriously. Whatever people think about the science behind these issues I have no doubt that we need to plan carefully for a world in which we cannot rely on our traditional sources of energy. I welcome the initiative that Vinnie is taking to raise our sights on this issue and recognise the potential problems for the future. If we start thinking about these issues now we are more likely to be in a position to address them in time.” Mr McCann is gathering names of people and organisations to help him get the Transition Town project off the ground.

“We will be looking to local business and the council for support, to help us rebuild the resilience and self-reliance in our local economy and community that has disappeared during this era of cheap and abundant fossil fuels. For example, we will be looking at ways which can help reconnect local people with local produce using land c o m m u n i t y s u p p o r t e d agricultural projects. we need a restoration project for an environmental centre in Maidenhead itself. This could be the first project of restoration using
Transition Town planning and ethos leading to the building of an exceptional example for sustainable living both in its representation and function. There is a long way to go but it all starts here,” he said.

There are currently 17 formally designated Transition Initiatives, including: Totnes, Lewes, Stroud, Bristol, Brixton, Forest Row, Glastonbury, Forest of Dean and 50 embryo schemes.

“This is an interesting initiative aimed at getting communities to come together to think seriously about how they can at grass roots level plan for the future and start to make the changes that will be needed. For example, I’m already very supportive of the idea of using local produce where possible and this seems to me to be a good way in which we can all make a change. Some people may question some of the ideas used elsewhere like a local currency but it’s important to open our thinking as it is only by doing that that we can ensure we are aware of the future challenges and the way to address them,” Mrs May added.

Mr McCann is talking to business leaders including local business visionary Tony Buzan as well as campaigners elsewhere in the country about building a transition movement in the Thames Valley. He wants to hear from key individuals in the business and conservation. He has already earmarked Friends of the Earth and Countryside Protection of Rurual England for special attention.
The leading Transition Town, Totnes, officially launched towards the end of 2006. It already has many projects in place building up local resilience such as energy, economy, food and health. Other key areas like education, transport, textiles, psychology of change, waste and water are being scruitinised.

Mr McCann said: “Businesses that have a longterm perspective and are aware of the constraints fossil fuel depletion will have on the globalised economy need to be looking in general at oil dependency throughout their organisation.” One Transition initiative finding favour is called business exchange where one business’ waste is a raw material for another. For example, the building
trade discards huge amounts of wood that could be used by companies making wood chips for household boilers using that fuel.

Surprisingly another high profile way of building local resilience in the business sector is launching local currency. Totnes has complementary currency called Totnes Pounds which many businesses are using in payment for goods and services. “A Transition Town envisages a more localised future, where production and consumption occurs closer to home; where fragile supply chains that are vulnerable to surges in oil prices have become prohibitively expensive and have been replaced by local networks,” McCann explained.

He is planning an official launch in February after recruiting a steering group to get businesses, Maidenhead Chamber, the council and environmentalists involved and recruitment through the likes of Youtube. Ideally he would like special projects involving the
protection of agriculture and cycle schemes.

For further details about the initiative please contact Vinnie Mc Cann at 07787 184706 or vinnie@walthamplace.com or visit the Transition Network website at www.transitiontowns.org/ TransitionNetwork.

**FACT FILE**

**What is a Transition Town?**

A Transition Town recognises four things. Firstly, that life with dramatically lower energy consumption is inevitable, and that it’s better to plan for it rather than be taken by surprise. Second, that our communities currently lack the resilience to handle the severe energy shocks that peak oil will bring. Third, that we have to act for ourselves and we have to act now. And lastly, that by unleashing the genius of the local community to creatively design our energy descent, we can build ways of living that are more connected, more enriching and that recognise the biological limits of our planet.

**What is Peak Oil?**

Peak oil is the point at which the amount of oil being pumped into world economies reaches a maximum. From that date onward, there’s an inexorable decline.

**What is the Transition Town Network?**

The Transition Network’s mission is to inspire, inform, support and train communities as they consider, adopt and implement a transition initiative. They’re building a range of materials, training courses, events, tools and techniques, resources and a general support capability to help these communities.

**How does it start?**

Atransition initiative typically emerges within a community when there’s a confluence of awareness of both peak oil and climate change, an eagerness to take action, and a desire to learn what other communities have done. Internet-based research for community solutions to the challenges ahead will eventually bring up examples of many of the transition initiatives that are underway around the UK. Alternatively, seeing a presentation on this subject can generate a phenomenal amount of latent energy in individuals and groups and can spark off a progression of community action leading to a transition initiative.

**Who gets involved?**

Anyone with something to contribute can participate. Once the initiative has formed a core team, two key processes kick off: mapping the community for existing green projects and raising awareness within the community.

**DATES AND BOOKING**

The dates for the first Transition Training courses are:

Totnes – September 21st / 22nd, and October 19th / 20th: contact Ben Brangwyn benbrangwyn@transitionnetwork.org for more info – the courses are filling up quickly already.
Bristol – November 2nd /3rd: contact Sarah Pugh on Sarah@transitioncitybristol.org for more info.

**CONTENT**

The course is designed to give a detailed introduction to the most important skills necessary to successfully set up, develop, and run a Transition project in your locality. It is designed for people who are already in a group working to achieve this, or are thinking of creating such a group.

At the end of the course participants will:

* Have a clear understanding of the context for transition towns, the current global situation and the transformational possibilities that arise from climate change and peak oil and gas
* Know what the TT model is, including an in depth look at the key 12 Steps of Transition, from inspiration, setting up the initiating group, all the way to having active and effective working groups
* Have experienced a joint visioning process
* Understand how to organise effective meetings such as public talks, open space days and small theme working groups
* Understand the purpose and principles of an Energy Descent Plan
* Have the outline of an effective and inspiring talk on Transition Towns
* Have formed useful contacts with other Transition initiatives, and met some of those involved in the Totnes project and Transition Network
* Have a plan of action for themselves and their locality

This training will follow the transition model in paying attention to both the outer work and the inner work necessary for a successful transition process. This will be a participatory process, with delegates invited to share their own experience and learn from the many different transition initiatives represented at each course.

**NUMBERS**

There’s room for only 16 at this stage for the courses in Totnes. Bristol numbers may extend to around 20. We recommend that two individuals from each community attends – that way the knowledge is shared and there isn’t just one person with “the knowledge”. If numbers are tight and we have more than 2 applying from a single community, we’ll probably ask the local steering groups to decide which two should attend.

**COSTS**

Totnes: The cost of the Totnes training is £95 per person, with £40 due on booking and the balance on arrival. This includes refreshments and all training materials. In Totnes you will be given £T5 (five Totnes pounds) to buy lunch on the two days.

Bristol: £65 per person (contact Sarah for further details).

Please let the organisers know if you need help with finding accommodation, or cannot afford the course fee.

**TRAINERS**

The trainers are **Naresh Giangrande** and **Sophy Banks**, both key contributors right from the very start of the Transition Town Totnes initiative.

**Naresh**: Focaliser of the Energy Group and one of the founders of the Transition Town Totnes project, Naresh has been involved in designing, running and evolving many of the events and groups that have been at the heart of the enormously successful TTT initiative. He has lived and worked in an eco community and was Managing Director of his own company.

**Sophy**: Sophy jointly focalises the “Heart and Soul /psychology of change” group as well as coordinating the central office and systems. A trainer for over 20 years she has worked as an engineer, information systems consultant and psychotherapist and has considerable experience of voluntary sector and community projects.